Addameer director Sahar Francis talks about the pervasiveness of incarceration in Palestinian society, how she and her organization have been targeted for their work, and what it means if the international community can’t hold Israel accountable.

As party lists are finalized in the lead-up to Israeli elections, the big bangs offer little substantive changes. And the challengers of the center look uncannily like the current leadership. A visual expression of the Israeli election campaign would look a lot like a Jackson Pollock painting. All of the parties running were required to finalize their lists on Thursday, and declare whether they would merge, split or stay single-by-choice. For 24 hours before the deadline, the parties darted around in a strategic frenzy accompanied by the relentless whine of 1,000 blooming rumors. The latest changes should be seen in…

After Israel boots the only internationally mandated human rights observer group in Hebron, Palestinian volunteers step up to monitor settler attacks amid a sense of heightened hostility. By Steven Davidson About a dozen Palestinian volunteers in blue vests identifying themselves as “human rights observers” made their way toward the Israeli army’s Checkpoint 56 on Shuhada Street in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron early last week. They were escorting children on their way to the Qurtuba school 100 meters away, enduring harassment and kicking by settlers as they let the schoolchildren pass. [tmwinpost] Up until late last month, this was…

The Abu Assab family home, located in Jerusalem's Old City, is expected to be occupied by right-wing Jewish Israeli settlers. Nearly 200 Palestinian families in East Jerusalem are under threat of eviction by settler organizations. By Aviv Tatarsky Israeli police evicted a Palestinian family from their home in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City Sunday morning. The home is expected to be occupied by right-wing Jewish Israeli settlers in the near future. [tmwinpost] The Abu Assab family had lived in the home for nearly 70 years. Seven members of the family, including a four-year-old child, were evicted on Sunday, with…

Israel's 300 Congolese asylum seekers have been living in the country for well over a decade. Now the Israeli government is trying to deport them back to their home country, considered one of the most dangerous in the world. By Ben Toren It was nine years ago that Julie Wabiwa Juliette narrowly fled her home in the Democratic Republic of the Congo for Israel, where she has since built a life. Juliette, 33, married another Congolese refugee, Christian Mutunwa, and together they raise two children. Both Juliette and Mutunwa work, as do all of the approximately 300 Congolese asylum seekers…

Israel recently published its catalogue of some 300,000 classified files, including thousands of documents from before the state was even founded. The very existence of the files had been kept a secret until recently. By Asaf Shalev Israel’s State Archives unceremoniously published the contents of its catalog of classified archive documents this past summer, posting them online in 363 separate spreadsheets. Buried in the catalog of classified archives were more than 100 files dating back to the 1800s, and more than 2,000 files that predate the founding of the State of Israel but which the archive has yet to declassify. [tmwinpost]…

For Israeli left-wing voters, nothing is more important than overthrowing Netanyahu. Yet despite their common cause, the left remains anything but united and it is polling at unprecedented lows. There is one thing shared by nearly every Israeli who does not define her or himself as right-wing: a profound desire to oust Benjamin Netanyahu. And yet, despite all their efforts, none of the left-wing parties today look capable of doing so. Polls show the left-wing Meretz party hovering near the four-seat minimum threshold to enter Knesset. and at least one poll had Labor down to just five seats in recent…

Bank für Sozialwirtschaft says it will conduct a 'scientific review' of Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East after the group was accused anti-Semitism by a leading Jewish organization over its support for the BDS movement. A German bank is trying to determine whether a German-Jewish group that supports Palestinian rights is anti-Semitic. [tmwinpost] In December of last year, Bank für Sozialwirtschaft (Bank for Social Economy) said it would conduct a “scientific review” of German-Jewish group Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East after the latter was accused of anti-Semitism by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. The Simon…

The 'coexistence model' is outdated and misleading. Instead, a Palestinian and an Israeli activist talk about eliminating systems of oppression from the bottom up — together. By Renad Uri and Omri Evron As the dispossession of Palestine enters its eighth decade and Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian people its sixth, it is time to finally change the conversation. [tmwinpost] Many summer camps and youth leagues promote a dialogue of coexistence on Israel-Palestine. This model is also adhered to in U.S. diplomacy regarding the conflict post-Oslo. The assumption that coexistence can solve deep-rooted issues is misleading, though. It creates a false sense of…

About +972 Magazine

+972 is an independent, blog-based web magazine. It was launched in August 2010, resulting from a merger of a number of popular English-language blogs dealing with life and politics in Israel and Palestine.